Paint
by mimirshead
Summary: Erwin was an artist. Levi happened to catch his eye.
1. Chapter 1

Levi's lower back was screaming at him. He didn't think he'd ever sat in one position for so long before. But honestly, the blanket was soft, and the room was warm. It wasn't that unpleasant. He glanced over his shoulder a bit more, and caught sight of the man smiling softly at his canvas.

"Just like that," he said, like he could see everything Levi was doing without looking. "You're doing great."

"How long have I been sitting here?" Levi asked, glancing down at the paint on the man's white jeans. Jeans shouldn't have been made in that color, and they definitely shouldn't have looked good on asshole artists that hired him to pose nude for paintings they wouldn't even show him before they were done.

"Not long enough," he said, cleaning off his brush. "But I'm almost done, I promise."

"How much longer?" Levi asked.

The man smiled wider, blue eyes flicking up off the canvas, and onto Levi's. Levi regretted meeting his gaze the minute he did. "Twenty more minutes?" he estimated. "Give or take some."

It had been nearly three hours if Levi's sense of time was correct. Three hours of being naked in front of a stranger. It was strange that he found that strange, considering he was a prostitute. He spent almost all of his time naked in front of strangers.

Most of those strangers weren't really looking at him though. Not like this. Not like they were hungry for every detail. He looked away again, hands tightening on his shoulders.

"Please hold still."

He swallowed, and turned his head slightly back to the man.

"You're beautiful," he said, and Levi felt a sudden rush of not wanting to be there. It was embarrassing. He didn't feel beautiful. He felt like he was being lied to. His skin was scarred, and tattooed, and it had been a long time since anyone had cherished anything about him.

"Shut up," he hissed. The man chuckled.

"I mean it," he said.

Levi didn't know how to respond to that. He tried desperately to hold still, wanting it to be over as soon as possible so he didn't have to continue feeling the slight heat in his cheeks. His thighs began to tremble from holding his legs in their crossed position.

"It's done," the man finally said. "Do you want to see?"

Levi disentangled himself from his own limbs, and thought for a moment about weather or not he did. Part of him almost didn't, but as he stretched out his body, The man turned the easel anyway.

The person on the canvas was not Levi. The person on the canvas was beautiful, cradled on the bed Levi had sat on, surrounded by greenery that wasn't actually there. That man wasn't him, but he had every tattoo Levi had, and his head cocked at the same angle, eyes slid over his shoulder to stare back at his real life counter part.

"This is how you see me?" Levi asked.

The man smiled. "It is. It's also where I think you'd be happiest."

Levi drew his legs up to his chest, and wrapped his hands around them, staring at the way the painting's back arched to look at him, stretching the large black, and white wings there.

"Your art is kind of shitty. This isn't realistic at all," Levi finally told him.

He smiled at that, turning toward the painting as he sat down next to Levi, bent half way forward. "It's not about realism," he said, to the perfectly realistic painting. "It's about how I see the world."

Levi stared at him a moment longer before reaching for his pants, and pulling them on. The man sat there, watching him move.

"Can I get your number?" he asked when Levi was depositing his personal effect back into his pockets. "I'd like to paint you again."

Levi stared at him a moment, before reaching back into his pocket, and giving him his phone. "Yeah, whatever, old man," he said.

The man smiled, and it was beautiful. Levi had a problem understanding how someone like that could look at him, and see any kind of anything worthwhile.

When he got his phone back, the contact was titled "Erwin Smith". He held it close to his chest a moment, staring at the man, the way his hair fell into his eyes now that he'd spent so much time leaned forward, and how there was just a bit of blue paint smudged on his jaw.

"See you next time, fuck wit," he said then, turning on his heel, and walking out. He knew where the door was. He didn't need the escort. Erwin gave it anyway, and when he stood on the other side of the door, and turned back to say something derisive, he was cut off by a playful hand ruffling his hair.

"See you next time, Levi."

Levi swallowed hard as the door shut gently in his face.


	2. What Are You Drawing?

The paintings must have started stacking up at some point. They lay on every surface, and leaned against walls. They hung in racks. Levi had never found himself so interested in pictures before. He also never thought so many would be of him.

There were four of him already. Four fully painted canvases, and countless sketches showing something that was undeniably the same character Erwin liked to depict him as. Then there were paintings of other people. People Levi had never seen before. Men and women that Erwin knew, and had relationships with, however professional or not professional.

Levi was secretly and protectively jealous in a way he didn't even want to allow himself to know, but couldn't really bury that deep. He stared, and wondered through Erwin's studio, trailing his fingers over the bumps in oils, and acrylics that had long since dried after being laid in their final resting places, seething over the other models that had graced Erwin's time.

How many of them had he proclaimed to be beautiful? How many of them held his interest, or his fancy in ways that Levi never could? How many had he had relationships with, or whispered sweet nothings to? Had any of their posing sessions ever ended in sex?

He chewed on the inside of his lip, and turned to the man, sitting at his desk, bent over a light table.

"Why am I here?"

There was a pause, a cock of the head. Blue eyes found him, flicked up, and down him a moment, and smiled. They smiled on their own apart from any other part of his face, the emotion starting there, and trickling out into his other features.

"I was wondering if you would let me pose you," he said. "Nothing intensive. Just an hour or so?" He said it like it was a question, or a request. It wasn't.

Levi was currently on the receiving end of the artist version of a booty call. Again. This must have been the twelfth time.

"What do you want?" he asked, reaching to take off his over shirt. He'd blown off a regular client for this. One who'd asked him out to dinner so he could sit on the other side of the table, and pretend to eat rabbit food while enduring dull conversation, and then go back to a hotel room, and get violently reamed in the ass. He was dressed nicely.

"No," Erwin said, holding out a hand as he stood up off his stool. "Keep your clothes on. I like them."

Levi blinked. That was a new request. Erwin tended to be all about having him undressed, naked, and prone in some position that seemed comfortable until he was lying in it for over an hour without being allowed to move, staring at the guy. The staring part wasn't so bad. Erwin wasn't the worst thing to look at.

Better than about ninety percent of his clientele.

Levi liked looking at Erwin.

"Really?" he asked, almost disappointed at the lost opportunity to be naked in front of a beautiful person.

"Really," Erwin said, leading him effortlessly through the paintings around them, stepping zig zag around a maze of his own artistic division. Levi wanted to order the room, pick it up, fold it away, and make it nice and tidy. He felt like it would be the equivalent of organizing Erwin's brain.

"If you could just sit down there," he said, pointing to a chair by the window.

Levi sat, crossing one leg over the other as he naturally would.

"So what are you trying to do?" he asked conversationally as Erwin pulled the easel over, and sat down with it between them.

"I'm working on gesture again," the man told him, pulling sticks of charcoal out of a pencil case. Levi watched as it stained his fingers black.

"Gesture?"

"It communicates the feel of a piece, sets the tone, and conveys the action as well as giving emotional depth."

Levi could hear his hands on the page, drawing the charcoal over it repeatedly. It looked like this would be a sketch session based on the lack of proper canvas, and paints. He thought about the dynamic poses he'd seen in some of Erwin's paintings just on the way in, and wondered what on earth he thought he needed more of.

"Again?"

"I work on it from time to time. Sometimes we get lazy, and complacent when we spend our lives doing something. We cut corners, we leave out important steps, and we forget key concepts, so it's important to revisit old lessons now and again. I tend to find that I can always glean new meaning from an old book."

"Good to know that's how you think of me," Levi quipped. "Is my binding really so worn?"

Erwin leaned around the easel, and smiled. "For someone who pretends to be so abrasive, you really can be quite sensitive, can't you?"

"What gave you that impression?"

"I'm good at reading people," he claimed nonchalantly before hiding again behind his art. Levi found that an accurate metaphor for what was probably most of Erwin Smith's life.

"So what are you drawing right now?" Levi asked.

"Your calves," Erwin said. "I like them. They've got a nice shape."

"You pick the oddest things to enjoy about me," Levi told him. He heard Erwin smile.

"Now I'm drawing your feet," he said. Levi tried to imagine it. "I like the way the left one is turned at three fourths perspective. Three fourths is my favorite. Spread your legs, and drop a hand into you lap."

Levi did as he was told, adjusting a bit to get more comfortable on the chair.

"You're gorgeous," Erwin said.

Levi stared at him, trying again to understand how a man like Erwin Smith could ever pay anyone else that complement after looking in the mirror every morning. He didn't say "thank you". He just let the words hang themselves around his shoulders like a pricey fur stole.

"What are you drawing?" he asked instead. Erwin's smile grew wider, directed toward the sketch.

"Your neck. I'm pulling the lines out through your shoulders, and into your arms. I'm really looking forward to your waist though. I almost wish this was a detail oriented practice. Those pants look very nice on you."

Levi scoffed at him.

"I was going to see a client. Someone higher up the scale. He probably would have asked me to change into something else."

"Like what?" Erwin asked, eyes lingering a bit on Levi's crotch, and the half assed job his hand was doing at shielding it from view.

"Like a dress. Mafia guys always want you to look like a pretty girl for them. They get all embarrassed at the idea of fucking a man, and people finding out."

"I bet you look good in a dress," Erwin said off handedly. Levi almost smiled.

"I look bitchin' in a dress," he said.

The cast Erwin's eyes took then was almost predatory. "Probably look better coming out of it though." It was probably a joke, but it was a joke that shot tendrils of radiating interest through the length of Levi's dick.

"Bet you'd like to know."

"Maybe someday," Erwin said. "Unbutton your shirt."

Levi swallowed, and followed the instruction.

"Brace your hand on the front of the seat between your legs, and lean forward on it. Now turn your head to you left a bit. Good."

"You're being specific today," Levi noted, staring at Erwin out of the corner of his eye.

"I can't really help it if I know what I want out of you."

"Oh, and what's that, Mr Smith?" Levi got that same predatory look from the man.

"Bet you'd like to know," Erwin parroted infuriatingly, quite clearly all too smug with himself. Levi hated his guts. He also desperately wanted to suck his cock.

"What are you drawing?" he asked again.

"Your arm," Erwin said. "I like the way you've pushed up your sleeve."

Levi bit his lip. Erwin very abruptly stopped doing what he was doing, and stared at him.

"Stay right there," he said, pulling out another large sheet of paper. Levi held the pose as best he could while trying to stay somewhat relaxed. "I mean it when I say you're gorgeous," Erwin claimed. "You're fucking stunning."

Levi tried desperately not to watch his face do that thing it did when he got lost in the details of something. The way his mouth moved just a bit, and his eyebrows furrowed. He had realized the third time they'd met that Erwin had a habit of mimicking his facial expressions while he was drawing them. It was cute for lack of a better word.

He would have said something if he hadn't been told to hold his bottom lip between his teeth. It made it very difficult to speak properly.

"Tell me, can you feel the difference between your plain skin, and your tattooed skin?" he asked. Levi glared at him. "Am I doing the dentist thing again?" Erwin asked. He didn't need a response to know he was. "Probably not, huh," he said going back to the first thought, laying his eyes on Levi's neck where a Russian word curled around his jugular. It would have been covered if his shirt had been done up properly, but it wasn't. "They don't look as good if they scar, if I recall correctly. Do they taste different?"

Levi took a harsh breath, and focused as hard as he could on not breaking the pose. He wanted to invite Erwin to find out. It was probably a joke, but it wasn't a joke that he minded playing with. Instead he attempted to convey that through the look he gave the man.

"Stay very still, alright?"

Did he know how hard he was making it to do that? Levi wondered that very often. Levi also genuinely wondered if Erwin would mind him getting an erection while posing naked. He just said the most misleading things sometimes. Maybe it was his intent to get Levi hard. Maybe he was seeing just how far he could push him.

Levi hated him. He hated him with a fucking passion. He really did.

"Okay," he said after a few long moments silence. "Okay, we can go back to sketching now."

Levi took a deep breath, and sat back in the chair, sliding one shoulder out of his shirt. He was getting impatient. Either he wanted Erwin to actually make a move, or stop playing around with him. It wasn't fair. "Life isn't fair," a million fictional role models whispered in his ear.

Erwin still looked hungry. As if perhaps Levi's steadily decreasing amount of clothing really was having an effect on him.

"What are you waiting for, old man?" he asked. "Sketch me already. I'm not a statue that you can ask to just sit around all day, you know?"

"I almost wish you were sometimes," Erwin said. "That would mean I got to keep you."

"Do you want to keep me?"

Erwin took a breath that was followed by a moment of tense silence, and then he exhaled slowly through his nose. "Wouldn't you like to know?" he said again.

Levi rolled his eyes. "Man the fuck up, Erwin," he said.

Erwin smirked, inhaled, and turned back to the easel. "My parents were upper class Georgian socialites, it isn't in my genetic coding to be straight forward in any pursuit."

"You seem rather blunt when you're talking about shit like how attractive I am," Levi countered.

Erwin's smirk turned back into a proper smile. "Maybe you've caught me in that," he said. "But I have reasons that I can out and out state things like that."

"That's bullshit, and you know it," Levi said as the sound of charcoal on paper started up again.

"What are you drawing? he asked.

"You." Erwin said, eyes hooded. Levi felt his breath catch in his chest.


	3. Recognition

Of course there were lulls in Erwin's phone calls, days where Levi lounged around the red light district, and only answered his cell to business because Erwin likely had other models, other things to waste his time with. Didn't stop Levi from mourning the sudden loss of contact. They'd been doing this for three months now, and Erwin had become a sort of stable platform for him to bounce back off of.

Now, of course, it was just another phone call from a regular client, telling him to come in a dress. "That black one with the low back that shows off your wings," he was told. He complied. The customer was always right, after all. It took about an hour of makeup application, and time pouring over himself, making absolutely positive that every bit of hair had been removed from his body before he finally got dressed, and headed for the place he had been told to wait.

The car was already there, and the driver gave him a look that attempted to remind him of his place on the totem pole.

"Black hair today, Miss Rivialle?" he asked, when Levi slid into the back seat.

"My natural color," Levi said in a slightly raised voice, putting a crown on the image of his femininity, and keeping it there.

The drive was short, and annoying. He was dropped off at his client's house, and shunted into another car, sitting one leg crossed over the other in the back seat beside him.

"It's good to see you," he said. His name was Antonio, he was a big wig in some drug cartel, and he was wearing sun glasses inside.

"It really has been too long," Levi lied. "Where are we eating today?" he asked, trying to keep the strain off the word eating, because he would not be eating at all. He would be ordering a salad, and watching as Antonio ate, probably still wearing his sunglasses, probably dripping steak juices out of his mouth. It would be disgusting.

"This nice little restaurant down by the harbor. It's new. French, I believe."

That meant snails, and that meant garlic. Too much garlic. Levi smiled, and didn't say anything about it.

He was regaled with complements on his looks, and how thin his wrists were the whole drive. Hands were put on his skin, and he was pulled closer across the seat, and true to his professionalism he never made one complaint. Antonio thought he was hot shit though, something Levi had a hard time wrapping his head around, because the guy was actually chicken shit, and he didn't know how to handle himself in the sack even a little bit.

Men could be so full of themselves.

The restaurant was nice. The waiters had special, fancy names, and spoke in fake accents, though, which sort of ruined the whole thing. They were seated in a nice booth, and treated to warm bread that Levi didn't eat any of.

Antonio talked about business, and how much money he was bringing in, and said being rich was the least he could do for a high class woman like Levi. Levi tried not to sneer too much, as he kept up the chatter.

He honestly hated the move from small time to big wig. Sure, the money was better, but now he was treated like a classy escort as opposed to a bag, and tag. He much preferred the lack of posturing that had come along with being a street hook-up.

Agencies screwed you over, but you made better money in them, and you were able to establish clientele so you could go solo. Of course, once you were solo, the clients you had already had an idea of taking you out on the town before fucking you.

Levi took a deep breath, and leaned his chin on his palm, wondering how long this whole "date" would take when he noticed the man in the next booth.

He was more cleaned up that Levi had ever seen him, hair combed perfectly into place unlike most of the time, but there was still something very familiar about the fact that there was a pen in his hand. There was a pen in his hand, and he was looking at Levi.

Erwin Smith had found himself in the same restaurant, sitting with a woman Levi recognized from some of his paintings, and a man who was turned away from him, sketching him in a notebook as he waited for his food, and looking incredible in a suit. The best part, Levi realized, was that he didn't even know who he was sketching.

He caught Erwin's eye, and smiled, getting a near coy smirk in response.

Antonio said something about buying him the best champagne in the house, and Erwin turned the page. Levi leaned back into another pose, and let Erwin keep sketching. He was only a table away. Close enough that Levi could hear the woman talking up, and down about college courses, and humanities.

"You're quiet tonight," Antonio observed.

Levi blinked at him slowly. "Merely stuck with anticipation," he said, Antonio smiled widely. He wasn't a bad looking guy. He was simply insufferable. Insufferable with no great endowment to make up for it.

Levi heard Erwin turn another page, and shifted slightly to give him another angle.

"I see you're restless," Antonio said. Levi smirked, throwing his eyes over the man's shoulder to look at Erwin who was quickly catching onto his little game.

"Have you found yourself a model?" the woman beside him asked just as Levi said "I'm sure you know why."

"Yes," both men answered in unison.

The waiter arrived then to take their order, and Levi was indisposed talking about salad in a way that he was just picky enough to be high-maintenance-girlfriend, but not enough to be an annoyance. It was a fine art that he had refined in the field of something he didn't even care about because salad was salad. No matter what was on it, it all tasted like rabbit food.

He was infinitely jealous when Antonio ordered a steak, but was quite happy when he excused himself to the bathroom.

"You seem bored with your company," Erwin said the minute he was out of ear-shot.

"Dates," Levi gave him, voice still pitched higher than his own, hand waving in the air to make it all inconsequential. Erwin smirked at him. "The man's all bark, no bite. I could use some bite," he added.

The woman beside Erwin seemed to light up at that, pushing his arm as if to congratulate him on being such a competent fisherman.

"Of course," Levi continued. "I doubt I'd get any from you."

"And why's that?"

"Let me guess. Artist type, picks hot young things up, and has them strip naked for him so he can paint them, flirts, and flirts, but never goes through with anything he's saying?"

Erwin's eyes narrowed playfully. "Do I know you?"

"I don't imagine you'd have noticed if you did," Levi said.

"Really."

"Why would a girl like me talk to a shit stain like you?" Levi asked. He watched it dawn on him in slow motion right as Antonio got back.

He postured for a moment before asking, "Is this man bothering you, sweet-heart?" The woman at Erwin's table was "oo"ing low in her throat like a middle schooled watching to of her peers face off.

"What man?" Levi asked. The "oo"ing turned into a loud "Oh!" followed by a quiet "burn". Antonio smirked at him.

Erwin, forever undeterred by Levi's petty name calling and half-hearted insults kept sketching him, and Levi continued to make it interesting.

They still finished dinner up rather quickly, and Levi found himself reluctantly shunted out the door, the tattooed wings on his back serving as a dead give away for everyone at Erwin's table as he was paraded toward the valet service.

"Is that Levi?" he heard the woman ask.

"It couldn't be anyone else," Erwin told her.

Levi found himself pretending Antonio was someone else that night, when he was stripped out of his dress, and his nice jewelry. Someone taller, and blonder, with blue eyes, and a ridiculous smile. He didn't have to fake an orgasm. His mind provided him with one, even if Antonio couldn't.

The next morning, after he was driven home just a bit on the right side of tipsy, and fell asleep in his own bed without anyone there, he was awoken by a phone call.

"You do look hot in a dress," was the first thing that was said after his groggy little greeting.

Levi smirked, and held back a stupid smile as he rolled over to stare at the ceiling like a stupid teenaged girl with a crush. "Still think I'd look better getting out of it?" he asked.

"Oh, definitely," Erwin said.


End file.
